At Beyond the Box, we are constantly thinking of ideas to give something unique, refreshing as well as challenging to our community of writers. Two to Tango is one such endeavour to encourage the participants to work along with another writer as a team and bring about a creative synergy. 40+ teams participated in Season 3 of this one-of-its-kind contest and the winners were chosen by prolific author Kanchana Banerjee. Below prompt was given to the writers and they were asked to narrate the same story from two different points of view.
Prompt – Write a fictional story in which a book reveals a secret. Feel free to creatively interpret the prompt in any genre of your choice.
The 2nd Runners-Up in the adults’ category were Sangeetha Kamath Prabhu & Mithila Peshwe (Team 13). Enjoy their story!
The village of my dreams is a little German village named Musik-Ville, meaning “place of music.” This place is entirely inhabited by living musical instruments. The instruments here can not only make music all by themselves but can also speak and move around. The cottages have doors and windows that can open all by themselves, as the inhabitants do not have arms. Technology does not exist in Musik-Ville, which means all the villagers can live in harmony.
Andy had just asked him for his left arm, and he was not willing to part with it. It was his arm, for God’s sake! But the offer had been tempting. He was giving up his prized moustache.
A few years ago, in the Bengali town of Kalyani, there lived a young girl named Radha. She was a simple girl. She lived with her mother in a 2 BHK apartment above a sweet shop. Her father had gone to Chennai 10 years ago to make his fortune, but never wrote to them or sent any money back home. Her mother worked as a peon in a big office, and earned 1000/- a month, just enough for the two of them. Every morning she woke up at 5:30 in the morning to go to school, and by the time she came back, her mother would have left, but not without setting up lunch in the kitchen.
In the beautiful coastal town of Manarola, there lived a peasant girl named Lisa. She lived by the sea in a hut with her mother, as her father had left them when she was little. She didn’t have toys like we do, but she loved playing on the beach with her friends and helping people around her. There was no proper school in her town but she did her best to learn what she could and developed wonderful life skills as she grew up.
Two days before Christmas Eve, my friends and I went to an interesting place for our winter holidays. Suddenly, while exploring the place, we all fell into a spooky tree trunk. We were terrified when we found ourselves around a cold place. We were shivering due to the chills and thrills.
This year, Santa is not able to send gifts to the children all around the world as he has met with a tragic accident. He is wailing in pain and panting due to panic and discomfort. He is hoping to recover soon and praying fervently for himself and the children whom he does not want to disappoint.
“Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Rudolph and Blitzen FLY DOWN! FLY DOWN!….. WHOOSH”, bellowed Santa as they were in the air. Santa pondered as he was about to deliver the last batch of Christmas Gifts and he dreamt of sipping hot chocolate with Mrs. Claus and other elves in Santa Village soon.
It all started when Santa Claus was packing his gifts for the kids of the world. He found something weird about his chariot. When he took a closer look, he discovered that one of his reindeers was missing. He knew that his chariot couldn’t fly even if one reindeer was missing. So, he set out to find the missing reindeer.
